Unnatural Pursuits (1991)

User Rating:

6.1/10   

Director:

Christopher Morahan

Writer:

Simon Gray (writer)

Plot Keywords:

Independent Film

Awards:

1 win & 1 nomination

Cast

Alan Bates	...	Hamish Partt
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Brent Anderson	...	Sunny (Hotel Clerk)
Bob Balaban
Jack Gilpin
Paul Guilfoyle
David Healy
Tom Hickey
Walter Lewis	...	Richard
John Mahoney
Sara Newman	...	Suzie (video store clerk) (as Sara Mansfield)
Deborah Rush
Spike Spencer	...	Waiter
Sarah Sutton	...	Wendy
Keith Szarabajka	...	Digby Mason
Richard Wilson	...	Hector Duff
Paul Zimet

Directed by
Christopher Morahan

Writing credits (in alphabetical order)
Simon Gray		writer

Produced by
Barry Hanson	....	executive producer
Kenith Trodd	....	producer
Michael Wearing	....	executive producer

Original Music by
Robert Lockhart

Cinematography by
Alec Curtis

Production Design by
Jim Clay

Art Direction by
Chris Seagers

Makeup Department
Lesley Noble	....	makeup artist

Production Management
Tina Brawner	....	unit production manager: Texas

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Brett Fallis	....	first assistant director

Art Department
John Bohan	....	construction manager

Sound Department
Clive Derbyshire	....	sound recordist
David M. Roberts	....	boom operator: Texas
Aad Wirtz	....	sound re-recording mixer

Camera and Electrical Department
Kenny Ratliff	....	best boy
Des Whelan	....	camera operator

Music Department
Steve Parr	....	music mixer
Steve Parr	....	music recordist

Transportation Department
Ron Kern	....	transportation coordinator

Other crew
Thomas Martin	....	standby carpenter
Homer Jon Young	....	set production assistant

Production Companies

• A&E Television Networks
• British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)

Distributors

• A&E Television Networks

Also Known As:

Two Lumps of Ice (UK) (working title)

Runtime:

60 min

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Company:

A&E Television Networks

An allegory about the refusal of grace

It's been awhile since I've seen this. I remember it as an odd movie and overlong, but certain elements of it haunt me. A British playwright (Alan Bates) travels from place to place in the US using different theater groups to try out different endings to a play which he is chronically unable to finish. His drinking and chain smoking annoy everybody around him, and clearly get in the way of the fulfilment of a calling, the working out of his own authentic story, which finishing the play represents. I was particularly intrigued with two figures in the movie--an elderly homeless man and a young man on a skateboard--whom I take to be angels, or messengers of death, trying to warn him to mend his ways. I read the film as being not so much about addiction as about the refusal of grace.